Program notes by Eric Bromberger

String Quartet in F Major, Opus 77, No. 2
Franz Joseph HAYDN
Born March 31, 1732, Rohrau, Austria
Died May 31, 1809, Vienna

Haydn returned to Vienna from England in 1795 to discover that his music was much in demand. In 1796, Count Joseph Erdödy commissioned a set of six quartets from Haydn, and these were eventually published as his Opus 76. In 1799, Prince Lobkowitz–who would become Beethoven’s patron and who would receive the dedication of the Eroica–also commissioned a set of six quartets from Haydn. Haydn got the first two of these done, and then things changed.

In England, Haydn had been overwhelmed by the music of Handel, and in the years following his return from London his own interests were turning toward vocal music. In 1798, he completed The Creation, and the following year–just as he began the quartets for Lobkowitz–he started work on The Seasons. Given his new passion for vocal music, perhaps it was inevitable that Haydn should grow less interested in instrumental music, and now he was able to complete only two of the projected quartets for Lobkowitz. He published those two quartets as his Opus 77 in 1802, the year he turned 70.

All of this might suggest a falling-off in his final two completed quartets, but exactly the opposite is true–the two quartets of Opus 77 represent one of the summits of quartet-writing. In their balanced integration of all four voices, idiomatic writing, experiments with form, and genial spirits (this music is just plain fun), these pieces stand at a level of quartet-writing that all subsequent practitioners of the form have been hard-pressed to match.

If it is has become a cliché that Haydn liberated all four voices and made them democratic equals, then it should be noted that we return to an era of aristocracy in the opening movement of the Quartet in F Major, for the first violin pretty much dominates things here. Haydn avoids the traditional fast opening movement, choosing instead to set this at Allegretto moderato. The gracious swing of the first violin’s opening phrase will dominate this movement, and it even intrudes into the accompaniment when he introduces his second subject. Haydn builds most of the development on this phrase, and at the end it drives the movement to a full-throated climax.

Haydn reverses the expected order of the middle two movements. The minuet comes second here, but with it comes a further surprise: its marking is Presto, and the music zips along off-the-beat accents that often mask the downbeat. The trio brings yet one more surprise: Haydn slips into an unexpected key–D-flat major–as the upper voices weave their long melody over the cello’s steady drone.

Thereis no true slow movement in this quartet–the third movement is built on an elegant little march that is marked Andante. It begins not as a quartet but as a duet: first violin and cello alone lay out the quiet central theme, and eventually the two middle voices join them. The movement is structured on continual repetition of this one theme: it is varied and embellished as it proceeds and finally rises to a splendid climax. The opening march now returns in its original form to lead the movement to a quiet close.

The finale, marked Vivace assai (Very fast) seems to combine two quite different worlds–it is both a dance-finale and a sonata-form movement built on its firm opening idea. Full of energy, this movement whips along, its high spirits enlivened with some very graceful counterpoint, deft use of silences, and enough foot-tapping fun to send an audience out the door feeling better about the whole process of being alive.

String Quartet in F Major, Opus 135
Ludwig Van BEETHOVEN
Born December 16, 1770, Bonn
Died March 26, 1827, Vienna

This quartet–Beethoven’s last complete composition–comes from the fall of 1826, one of the blackest moments in his life. During the previous two years, he had written three string quartets on commission from Prince Nikolas Galitzin, and another, the Quartet in C-sharp Minor, Opus 131, composed between January and June 1826. Even then Beethoven was not done with the possibilities of the string quartet: he pressed on with yet another, making sketches for the Quartet in F Major during the summer of 1826.

At that point his world collapsed. His twenty-year-old nephew Karl, who had become Beethoven’s ward after a bitter court fight with the boy’s mother, attempted suicide on July 30. The composer was shattered–friends reported that he suddenly looked seventy years old. At the end of September, when the young man had recovered enough to travel, Beethoven took him–and the sketches for the new quartet–to the country home of Beethoven’s brother Johann in Gneixendorf, a village about thirty miles west of Vienna. There, as he nursed Karl back to health, Beethoven’s own health began to fail. He would get up and compose at dawn, spend his days walking through the fields, and then resume composing in the evening. In Gneixendorf he completed the Quartet in F Major in October and wrote a new finale to his earlier Quartet in B-flat Major, Opus 130. These were his final works. When Beethoven returned to Vienna in December, he went almost immediately to bed and died the following March.

One would expect music composed under such turbulent circumstances to be anguished, but the Quartet in F Major is radiant music, full of sunlight–it is as if Beethoven achieved in this quartet the peace unavailable to him in life. This is the shortest of the late quartets, and while this music remains very much in Beethoven’s late style, it returns to the classical proportions (and mood) of the Haydn quartets.

The opening movement, significantly marked Allegretto rather than the expected Allegro, is the one most often cited as Haydnesque. It is in sonata form–though a sonata form without overt conflict–and Beethoven builds it on brief thematic fragments rather than long melodies. This is poised, relaxed music, and the final cadence–on the falling figure that has run throughout the movement–is remarkable for its understatement. By contrast, the Vivace bristles with energy. Its outer sections rocket along on a sharply-syncopated main idea, while the vigorous trio sends the first violin sailing high above the other voices. The very ending is impressive: the music grows quiet, comes to a moment of stasis, and then Beethoven wrenches it to a stop with a sudden, stinging surprise.

The slow movement–Beethoven marks it Lento assai, cantante e tranquillo–is built on the first violin’s heartfelt opening melody. This opening is in D-flat major, but for the central episode Beethoven slows down even further (the marking is Più lento), moves to C-sharp minor, and writes music of a prayer-like simplicity. This section, full of halting rhythms, spans only ten measures before the return of the opening material, now elaborately decorated. The final movement has occasioned the most comment. In the manuscript, Beethoven noted two three-note mottos at its beginning under the heading Der schwer gefasste Entschluss: “The Difficult Resolution.” The first, solemnly intoned by viola and cello, asks the question: “Muss es sein?” (“Must it be?”). The violins’ inverted answer, which comes at the Allegro, is set to the words “Es muss sein!” (“It must be!”). Coupled with the fact that this quartet is virtually Beethoven’s final composition, these mottos have given rise to a great deal of pretentious nonsense from certain commentators, mainly to the effect that they must represent Beethoven’s last thoughts, a stirring philosophical affirmation of life’s possibilities. The actual origins of this motto are a great deal less imposing, for they arose from a dispute over an unpaid bill, and as a private joke for friends Beethoven wrote a humorous canon on the dispute, the theme of which he later adapted for this quartet movement. In any case, the mottos furnish the opening material for what turns out to be a powerful but essentially cheerful movement–the second theme radiates a childlike simplicity. The coda, which begins pizzicato, gradually gives way to bowed notes and a cadence on the “Es muss sein!” motto.

Program note provided by the artist

“A Collection of Short Works”

We like a good Haydn-Bartók-Beethoven quartet program as much as the next guy. Maybe more so. But every once in a while it’s nice to vary the menu a bit, perhaps enjoying a light tasting menu in lieu of a complex main course. There was a time, not so long ago actually, when one might go to hear a favorite artist give a violin recital and the program would consist of a couple of sonatas followed by a cornucopia of short works, varying in character. On this program we are hoping to recapture that spirit. Our selection is slanted toward Americana. It is bookended by Steve Mackey’s arrangement of Bernstein’s “I Feel Pretty” from West Side Story and his arrangement of Robert Pete Williams’ blues tune “I’ve Grown So Ugly.” Things change. We also have Ives’ self explanatory Scherzo “Holding Your Own,” and Elliott Carter’s early, meltingly beautiful Elegy. The remainder of the works are Eastern European, dances and songs. The Dvořák Waltzes sway and swirl, while the Shostakovich Polka displays a rather different attitude, hardly nostalgic or sweet. We include, as well, the justly famous Andante cantabile from Tchaikovsky’s Quartet in D Major the movement that famously caused Tolstoy to break down in tears. Tchaikovsky based the main theme of the movement on a tune he heard a carpenter singing. Since our cellist is married to a carpenter it seemed an apt thing for us to celebrate.

- Mark Steinberg